JUMPER'S KNEE

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Jordon from PhysioFitness Castle Hill will be providing some great information on the most common injuries in athletics each week! He will a quick summary on what injuries can develop on the track and field.

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PATELLAR TENDINOPATHY

The term is fairly self explanatory! Jumper’s knee (otherwise known as patellar tendinopathy) is when there is pain at the front of the knee due to lots of jumping and repetitive load. It can happen in a lot of athletic events, but the highest occurrence is in movements that require a high amount of spring-action e.g. long jump, high jump, triple jump, even hurdles! As the injury is in the tendon, very often the common feature is that it gets progressively worse when you’re loading it or the intensity increases. 

The cause for this condition can be a number of different reasons:

• Weakness or lack of control of the hips, and the muscles around the knee need to compensate
• There is an older injury on the other leg and you’ve been using this leg a lot more to keep the other safe (Compensation from the other leg)
• Reduced ankle or hip range of motion/flexibility
• Hypertrophy (increased muscle bulk) of the hamstrings and quadriceps leading to tightness around the knee
• Rapid growth in adolescents, where the sarcomeres are slow to adjust to growing bones, which increases pull-load on the insertions
• Poor foot anatomy/ flat feet, which causes a disruption in muscle balance around the balance (very often in conjunction with PF-syndrome)

It is necessary that if symptoms around the front of the knee start to develop with certain events, to be assessed as soon as you can by a health professional with expertise in movement. There are multiple ways to help treat this condition:

• Immediately reduce the weekly amount of physical activity and intensity
• Shift your focus to a mobility and stretching program 
• Strengthen your hip muscles
• Have your feet assessed in regards to their function and it’s affect on the knee

If these areas are not addressed, it is most likely the pain will continue to increase, and the prognosis to recovery will take even longer! Leaving you “out of the race” for a significant amount of time. If you or your child are concerned about symptoms around their knee with certain sports, we have the space and facilities within our gym to return them back to the track sooner rather than later!

Our clinic is located in Castle Towers Shopping Centre in the Fitness First. Call 9680 2422​ to make a booking with Jordon himself, or make sure to catch him on the field this Saturday!